1. Field of the Invention
The present invention is directed to a system which is particularly adapted for fighting fires below deck, within the hold of a ship, for example, for the protection of cargo which otherwise may be vulnerable to damage because of the inaccessibility of conventional fire fighting equipment. The system is capable both of manual and automatic operation, it may be used to spray water, fluids, foams or gases into the hold, and it may be adapted to monitor the ambient conditions in and around the cargo.
2. Description of the Prior Art
The container industry is one undergoing rapid development and containerization is becoming an accepted manner of shipping cargo, both by land and by sea. Ships characterized as containerships now sail the seas and at specially equipped ports containers may be received directly from the bed of a truck or other land-based transport and loaded on the containership for movement to an overseas market at which the container is removed from the containership for further transport.
The containership is constructed to receive the containers both above and below deck. For this purpose, the containership is provided with a plurality of hatches, each communicating with a hold below deck; and containers may be stored in a plurality of tiers in each hold. When the hold is filled, additional containers normally are received on the closed hatch covers and these containers may be stacked to a height of several tiers. Normally, the containership carries no lifting gear and once the hatch cover is in place, irrespective of whether containers are stacked thereon, the containers within the hold become inaccessible from above, that is through the hatch cover, and they are substantially inaccessible to normal fire fighting equipment from below. All in all, a below-deck fire aboard one of the present-day containerships creates a very dangerous situation and, in fact, in one disaster involving a containership in the recent past, it is considered that damage in the hold would substantially have been non-existent had there been a way to fight a fire as provided by the present invention.
The prior art includes systems for fighting fires aboard ships and representative of the same are the water sprinkler systems described in U.S. Pat. Nos. 2,051,103 to E. A. Pohlman and 2,576,143 to J. C. Rochet. These systems generally are similar in that they are described by piping communicating a sprayer in the several inner compartments of a ship with a reservoir or an inlet fitting at the side of the ship, respectively.
These systems are considered to have little or no applicability of use in a containership whose holds are open to containers received through the hatch and into a respective hold therebelow. This movement of containers prevents the disposition of conduits of the water system above the containers as described by Pohlman and Rochet and, further, these systems are capable only of fire fighting with water from a reservoir, for example. Further still, the Pohlman and Rochet systems are relatively complex in overall design.
U.S. Pat. No. 1,650,267 to V. G. W. Gilbert et al represents a further type of marine fire fighting system and particularly structure for mixing two components of a foam from separate sources and passing the foam to a distributor or head. The Gilbert et al system, other than the material which is used for fire fighting, is like those of Pohlman and Rochet, and it has no applicability of use in combination with the hatch cover of a containership.
U.S. Pat. No. 3,738,429 to V. H. Heller et al relates to a fire extinguishing system having a plurality of branch conduits disposed vertically between stacks of goods in a warehouse and connected to a main conduit supported on the ceiling of the warehouse. As discussed in connection with each of the above patents wherein the delivery conduit of the system is disposed under and supported by the structure between decks, the Heller et al patent has no application to a containership requiring a free opening between the deck and the area for stowage of the containers.
Additionally, none of the prior art systems have capability of providing a monitoring function through access to the system from an on-deck position and none of the systems is adapted to be disposed within an open space under a hatch cover for both monitoring and controlling the conditions within the hold therebelow.